So, you're credentials are that you are an amateur astronomer and Alexander's credentials are the same, I suppose.

Well, then, carry on amongst yourselves guys.

In the interim, we'll await Alexander's explanation as to what purpose he believes an ISS and Space Shuttle hoax serves although, we could really CARE LESS about this topic.

Not trying to be rude.

Just the truth.

That's all.

Seriously.

Presently, WE are more concerned about our country's economic crisis and those persons who are suffering due to the effects of same.

Quite frankly, I'm more interested in the welfare of our countrymen than I am about the ISS and Space Shuttle, in your opinion, being a HOAX because you have not proven that if it is a HOAX, this HOAX is detrimental to society.

But, please, continue to close your eyes and pretend that YOUR THEORY of an ISS and Space Shuttle hoax is more important than the REAL and PROVEN atrocities that are being perpetrated upon mankind, as I write, are less important.

In reply to Blueangel the reason why amateurs are debating this is because no-one else is brave enough to speak out about it.

As for the purpose of the hoax, I clearly revealed this at the end of my first post. In my opinion the Nazi rocket scientists in NASA weren't to be trusted......

As for why we should be concerned with such a hoax we're not just talking about the principle of the matter, this represents a huge fraud and criminal enterprise. You've got to admit it its far bigger than Enron.

As a self confessed victim of MK-ULTRA mind control, Blueangel, surely you should be highly concerned by trends like this as well? Surely this a striking example of a government body misleading the people and abusing our rights and freedom of knowledge? And surely the Space Shuttle and ISS represent a form of mind control themselves?

I used computer tracking; Satellite Tracker software by Brent Boshart. It's erratic because there's a lag between issuing a command to the computer to center it up and it being reflected in the tracking of the scope. There's also the issue that whenever the computer "hiccups" and accesses the hard drive the tracking shuts off for a split second before resuming. Getting it to stay on ISS at an equivalent of 200x or so is easy:
Getting it to do that with a 640x480 tiny little chip in a cheap webcam-style video camera at the equivalent of about 400x is difficult due to the tiny field of view and imperfections in the telescope's gears. If you were using an eyepiece with a good field of view like a 9mm Nagler though (even with a 2x barlow), it'd be as easy as the above video.

Brilliant, you explained it so well Astronut! This is why your video image of the ISS wanders around so erratically while your image of Saturn is so perfectly stationary even though of a similar angular diameter and viewed with the same computer tracking! You explained it so well, I couldn't have done better myself! Well done!

In reply to Blueangel the reason why amateurs are debating this is because no-one else is brave enough to speak out about it.

As for the purpose of the hoax, I clearly revealed this at the end of my first post. In my opinion the Nazi rocket scientists in NASA weren't to be trusted......

As for why we should be concerned with such a hoax we're not just talking about the principle of the matter, this represents a huge fraud and criminal enterprise. You've got to admit it its far bigger than Enron.

As a self confessed victim of MK-ULTRA mind control, Blueangel, surely you should be highly concerned by trends like this as well? Surely this a striking example of a government body misleading the people and abusing our rights and freedom of knowledge? And surely the Space Shuttle and ISS represent a form of mind control themselves?

Brilliant, you explained it so well Astronut! This is why your video image of the ISS wanders around so erratically while your image of Saturn is so perfectly stationary even though of a similar angular diameter and viewed with the same computer tracking! You explained it so well, I couldn't have done better myself! Well done!

If you wanted to know why Saturn is relatively stable in the video while ISS is not, you should have asked that question. You claimed you're an amateur astronomer, so I would have expected you to know the reason why the two are not comparable. Saturn isn't noticeably moving against the background stars in that short of a timeframe, and it certainly isn't hauling ass at several arcminutes per second. ISS is moving so fast across the sky that even my telescope's drives can't keep up if I'm using a 12 volt power source (like the marine battery I sometimes use when I'm doing astronomy in the middle of nowhere). At its full 18 volt-powered slewing speed it can keep up, but any slight inaccuracies or errors in the gear or pointing system are amplified many times over because of the speeds involved - as you can see in the second video, ISS is there but slightly off-center. It can be corrected with joystick inputs, but as 400x it's very easy to over-correct because the command has to go through an external laptop and be processed before being reflected in the telescope's motion. Again, this isn't the case with Saturn. Also, the motion of the gears themselves vibrate the telescope quite badly, requiring the use of anti-vibration pads and even then the problem is still present. None of this is the case when all your telescope has to do is track at a sidereal speed, as is the case with Saturn. Trying to compare the two is intellectually dishonest to say the least.

Astronut, the reason you give may explain why the ISS appears to drift to one side of the field of view only to be centred again each time but this is clearly not what is happening in your video. The image of the ISS is dancing around erratically and apparently at random.

As for titanium oxide having a bond energy of 458 eV (sic.) are you absolutely certain you didn't actually mean 458 kJ/mol? The two units are completely different. I wouldn't be surprised about the latter figure but certainly not the former.

Astronut, the reason you give may explain why the ISS appears to drift to one side of the field of view only to be centred again each time but this is clearly not what is happening in your video. The image of the ISS is dancing around erratically and apparently at random.

Getting and keeping ISS in the field of view at an effective magnification of 400x is much more difficult than doing the same with saturn; one is flying across the sky at several degrees per second at its peak, the other is almost stationary. Add to that, the lag between issuing a command in the satellite tracking and seeing it reflected on the screen, and with my color camera the framerate is almost-slideshow-like and you get massive over-correction. It's moving "erratically" because I'm having trouble getting it to center properly. You also get hiccups when the computer pauses for a split second to process the tracking commands - that results in it dashing out of the field only to return a moment later, assuming I didn't react to the sudden motion and "correct it" out of the field. Again, you're trying to compare centering a celestial object like saturn to centering a fast-moving satellite where the controls are sluggish and the slightest mistake is devastating. Last, but not least, to increase stability I always mount the LX200 in alt-az mode when doing satellite tracking. As you should know, alt-az has the nasty issue of field rotation; not so bad for short planetary observations, but devastating to long exposure images. This also affects satellite tracking for the same reason; in different parts of the sky, "up and down" in the eyepiece will mean totally different things in terms of right ascension and declination. For satellite tracking, this means that pushing "up" on the joystick will adjust the apparent position of the satellite one way at the start of a pass, and a different way at the peak of a pass. If you're using less magnification like in the second video, this is acceptable as long as you have room to play with, for 400x it means you're going to look like you're adjusting it erratically. For my second video, however, I had a wider field of view at the equivalent of 200x and the motion of ISS is quite stable.

Quote:

As for titanium oxide having a bond energy of 458 eV (sic.) are you absolutely certain you didn't actually mean 458 kJ/mol? The two units are completely different. I wouldn't be surprised about the latter figure but certainly not the former.

Astronut, scientific journals such as the one you quote from are not good sources in general when it comes to physical chemistry data. Are you sure you are not actually quoting for some other physical property relating to titanium oxide? Looking at your source this looks highly likely. "Plasma Nitriding of Titanium Particles in a Fluidized Bed Reactor at a Reduced Pressure from the Journal of the American Ceramic Society" WHAT........!!?? COME AGAIN.......!!??

According to the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, 75th Edition, the bond energy of Ti-O is 672.4 kJ/mol. This is equivalent to 6.98 eV. To convert to electronvolts you divide 672,400 by 6.022 x 10exp23 (the Avagadro constant which is the total number of molecules in a mole) and then divide this by the total energy is a single electronvolt which is 1.6 x 10exp-19 joules.

You see titanium oxide is not such a strong bond after all and would easily be broken up by the Sunís UV rays.

Astronut, scientific journals such as the one you quote from are not good sources in general when it comes to physical chemistry data.

It's actually a much more reliable source. It clearly states that the Titanium oxide bond energy is 458eV. Not kJ/mol. Laughing at it won't make it go away. Here's another reference:
Xuebin Zheng, et al 2000 Bond strength of plasma-sprayed hydroxyapatite/Ti composite coatings.
Are you sure you weren't quoting the strength of a Ti-O bond?

Quote:

You see titanium oxide is not such a strong bond after all and would easily be broken up by the Sun’s UV rays.

Titanium will not disintegrate under UV light, that's insane. Indeed, the presence of an electronegative The fact that I can personally see and photograph the space station confirms this simple fact.

Of course I was referring to the bond strength of Ti-O. What do you think I was talking about? You said the Space Shuttle was coated in titanium oxide which would not break down in the Sun's UV. Here's your quote to prove it:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Astronut

Titanium oxide (which would be the outermost atomic layer of ISS's skin) has a bond energy of 458 eV.